Heater Work

The heater in our 109 worked, but not nearly enough to reach the middle row where the kids sit. When the previous owner installed the Chevy 250, he removed the coolant valve which turned it into something like a defender heater in that coolant was constantly flowing through the heater core. You "controlled" the interior temperature by turning the fan on or off.

Once the truck was at operating temperature, the bulkhead gave off more heat than the heater.

Since we were going to tear the truck down as part of the frame swap, I decided to see what I could do to make the heater perform better. One of the best things about Series trucks is that they are so easy to take apart--in about 15 minutes, I had the heater matrix/core and fan removed and taken apart. From the pictures above, you can see that the bottom of the heater matrix box was badly rusted with a couple of fairly large holes in it. Also, the matrix box was manufactured with four sets of holes for the inlet/outlet core pipes. The three sets that aren't used were covered, barely, with what looked like really old, brittle electricians tape.

I had new sheet metal scab welded onto the bottom of the matrix box and over the three sets of unused holes. Now, I just need to paint the box and seal up any gaps with silicon. I will not be able to install and test it until the 109 is back together in about one month so stay tuned for updates.

Here are a couple of shots after the matrix box/cover had been cleaned up and given a good coat of primer. There are four or five small rust holes that I will have to seal with silicon or something similar.